If I had to guess, I would think that the season ticket holders in question would turn out to be easily identifiable ticket brokerages. Dumping tickets on Stubhub for those useless games in June, July, August, and September still probably works out in their favor. The huge mark-up for games against the Cardinals, the other premier teams in the NL, the Crosstown games against us, and attractive interleague games against the Yankees or Red Sox makes their seasons. Those $5 and under tickets on Stubhub all season long had to absolutely kill the Cubs' walk-up revenue.

It's one of the big drawbacks of losing 100 games. Far more people lately are buying cheap tickets on the secondary market and avoiding the team, and the money received from Stubhub doesn't make up the difference from all those lost ticket sales. If the 90+ loss seasons don't disappear by 2015, even those premium games won't draw sellout crowds anymore, and the park might see 10K less fans per game.

The Cubs don't really have a choice here.

To only select 40 accounts makes me think there has to be something more to this.

The amount of season ticket holders that were dumping Cub tickets on the secondary market for a roll of toilet paper last season had to be in the hundreds to thousands.